So cute!
My kids are starting to want to be friends with a child other than the one they
shared a womb with. Next thing they will be asking for the car keys and beer
money. *Sob* They grow up so
quickly.

Which
brings me to my point. Dudes, what’s the
deal with play dates? Apparently some
kids go to other kid’s houses after school for a play date. Sounds like fun, except who gets to choose the
play date? I assume the moms have to come
too? Now, the problem is, if these play
mates come in pairs (one kid + one mom), who gets to pick? Because it does not necessarily follow that
fun kid = fun mom.

Only
joking of course, my kids are allowed to pick their own friends (after I’ve
vetted them and interrogated their parents for half a day), but how do you
handle the date with the mom? Must be a
bit like a blind date. “So, tell me a
bit more about yourself….”

I don’t
think my kids are quite ready to be on their own at someone’s house for a play
date, although I would be more than willing to have one of their little friends
come to play at our house, with or without their moms. I just hope the friends they pick have cool
moms too. Or even better! Handsome dads! Yeah! Now THAT’s my kind of fun play date. Only joking Marko! Haha, funny old me. (Rats! Must stop husband from
reading my blog)

Do you
think its ok to serve alcohol at these play dates? And to the mothers? Oh, I am so funny. I think I am delirious actually. Over worked and under slept. So dudes, share a little more about this new
phenomenon called ‘The Play Date’. I
need rules, guidelines, etiquette and potential pitfalls to look out for.

I was
thinking about celebrity parents recently, and I wondered how different their
lives were from mine and yours. One of
the biggest things I’ve always envied about celebs is their staff compliment. I
fantasize about having personal chefs, and 24 on call masseuses. A personal stylist and your own shopper.
Imagine outsourcing all the drudge work to paid help.

And then I
wondered about their other paid help, the nannies, au pairs and other child
helpers. I wondered which of the parenting drudge work they outsourced to
others. (Lets face it, parenting is not
exactly all sunshine and roses all the time, there is a LOT of pretty routine
work involved!)

I wonder
what parenting drudgery I would outsource to others if I could….

Not too
much, to be honest. The taking and
fetching from school I love doing. My mom offers to do it sometimes and I have
to force myself to say yes. I LOVE taking them to and from school.

As for
the night-time wakings (few and far in between as they are now), no, not that
either. When they were newborns I hired a night nurse who lasted exactly two nights.
There was no way on earth that I could lie there and not attend to my children at
night. It was a total waste of money. I
like being there for my children at night.

Hmm, what
else? Doctors appointments….like doing
it. Trips to the park…..like doing
it. Walks? Like doing it. Games, playing, puzzles….I like doing it. In fact, even with the routine drudgery, I like doing almost all of it.

However,
the one thing I would DEFINITELY outsource if I could (because I really, really
hate it), is the feeding thing. I would outsource that in a heartbeat. But for the rest of it, I can’t really think
what I would rather not do myself.

If you
are wondering what the hell I am talking about as I have a nanny… Rose does all
of that when I am working, but when I am there, I do it. Perhaps the celebs do that too. Perhaps when they are there, they all do all
the drudge work too. What do you think
really happens behind their closed doors and what would you outsource if you
could?

By now
you will have heard about the terrible xenophobic attacks happening in
South Africa. I haven’t spoken about it
yet because I have been so ashamed. So very ashamed and so deeply disappointed in my
countrymen. For the first time since
those dark days of apartheid, I was ashamed to be South African.

But over
the last few days my dark despair is lifting, and once again my faith in my
fellow South Africans is being restored. The xenophobic attacks and blatant criminal acts are still deeply
disturbing, but what is coming to light is that the majority of South Africans
are warm, caring people who will open their hearts and their homes to people
from all cultures and all nations across the world. In the midst of this terrible crisis ordinary
South Africans have not only expressed their feelings in their words, but in
their actions as well. My best friend and
Nurture Egg Donor partner Melany has started her own blanket and baby food
drive, my sister Melanie has spent the entire weekend handing out food and
supplies to refugees (see here and here) and my dear young friend Rafiq (the “if only I was 17
years younger” one) has put together an amazing site called United for Africa where ordinary
people like you and me can keep up to date with what is happening on the
ground, and see how we can help the poor victims of this humanitarian crisis. Please click here to view.

To the
ordinary South African who have extended their hands in help, thank you. To the
criminal element who have perpetuated these terrible attacks, SHAME ON
YOU. To my brothers and sisters from
Africa, I am so terribly sorry. Please
know that to the majority of South Africans you are our brothers and sisters,
and you are always welcome in our home.

This
morning, as I was getting dressed, I put my foot into my shoe and I immediately
sensed
something was amiss. Something was poking into me. It wasn’t the seam
(my feet know about seams, they have an understanding), and it wasn’t the shoe.
It was something new. I squiggled my
toes around to see whether it would go away, but it was still there. I took my
shoe off and shook it. Ah HA! There’s the culprit! A tiny piece of a label that I had cut off a
shirt earlier (can’t remember if it was from my shirt or from Adam’s) had
fallen into my shoe. My first reaction
was “I can’t believe I can feel a tiny piece of soft cloth in the bottom of my
shoe and my second thought was “That poor princess in the ‘The Princess and the
Pea’ was quite clearly sensory defensive, which is why she could feel the
pea through the 20 mattresses and 20 feather beds.”

I am so
bad at this sensory stuff that I can’t even stand pokey scratchy things on
others. My dogs have never worn collars,
unless of course if they go for a walk. The thought that the collar might poke and scratch without them being able
to tell me drives me crazy. But when I
took the puppies to puppy classes, the teacher said the puppies must wear
collars to get used to them. So I put
collars on them. For about 3 weeks. I
drove Marko crazy. “Do you think they
are too tight? I’m sure they are too tight. Do you think they are too heavy? Perhaps the collars are irritating them. Do you think they are ok?” Eventually I just gave in and took them
off. MUUUUCH better.

So, I can
relate to the Princess. I bet she also
wears her panties inside out so that the seams don’t poke into her and I bet
her husband, the prince, also gets a little put out the she never wears any of
his jewelry (jewelry is horrible and pokey scratchy, can’t wear it). I bet she hardly ever wears make up and ties
her hair up all the time. And I bet she’d
also feel a tiny piece of cloth at the bottom of her trainers.

You know,
you should feel sorry for the Princess and I. It isn’t easy being so full of
shit for so much of the time.

I am
wearing make up today, the second time IN A WEEK (can you cope!) I can’t wait to get to 6pm when I can take it
off. I could take it off now, but that would be a waste. I might as well look
gorgeous for a bit longer, seeing as I already have this gunk on my face.

Anyway, I
was peering in the mirror, checking to see that my mascara hadn’t smudged further
than my top lip when I noticed that my eyebrow pencil had smudged a little (have
very little body hair, need to colour in eyebrows). I leant forward (eyes failing) to rub
the smudge line away and took a step back again to admire my handiwork. Lo and
behold, the bloody line was still there. Leant forward, rubbed harder. Still there.

O.M.G It isn’t a smudge line, it’s a fucking
wrinkle! I have wrinkly eyebrows. Shoot me now, my life is officially over.

It’s
quite fascinating really, watching my body degenerate before my very (wrinkly)
eyes.
What the hell happened? Wasn’t it just yesterday that I was young,
taut and wrinkle free? I now have
wrinkly eyebrows and wrinkly feet. It would
appear I am ageing from the extremities inwards. Thank god between my youthful vagina
(hardly used, still in original packaging) and fake 20-something year old boobs, my
middle is positively pubescent. If I wear
a balaclava and ankle boots I could pass for a 25 year old any day.

I don’t believe in regrets. Even though I haven’t exactly lived a very
saintly life (one could in fact, argue for the complete opposite), I still don’t
believe in regrets. Sure, I have done
some things I am not very proud of (times when I’ve hurt people, like my sister
during my infertility years and my parents during my druggy years), but I don’t
spend time agonising about the past. It happened;
I can’t go back and change it.

But while I don’t believe in living in the
past, I do think you can learn an enormous amount from the past experiences of
other people, good and bad. I absolutely
love reading articles and stories written by older, more experienced people
where they reminisce about their lives and share some of the life lessons they have
learnt. And as you know, I am not afraid
to ask for assvice, opinion and experiences from others. I know some people don’t like it, but I
really love it. Why not learn from others? Sure, not all of it will be relevant, not all of it will resonate with
me. For every 10 pieces of (often
conflicting) assvice I get, I will perhaps only internalise one. But some of
those ones that do resonate with me are extremely powerful. My mother is especially brilliant at handing
out little gems of advice and past experiences. Especially about marriage and raising children. As someone who has been married for 40 years
and who has raised four children (and helped to raise 7 grandchildren), I learn
a huge amount of her.

In actual fact, I believe you can learn
from just about anyone. Even if it is
only to say “that it something I would never do”.

So, with that in mind, I am keen to learn
from you. Looking back at last week,
last month, last year, the last decade, the past lifetime, what is it that you
wished you had done or not done that you would pass on as a piece of advice to
others who might follow your path. About
marriage, parenting, work, life in general. I am not talking about regrets; I am
talking about opportunities to learn.

Here is mine, for what it is worth:

I wish I had established good eating behaviour in my children right from the start. Fed them a variety of different foods. I wish I had realized that if they refused to eat a meal, they wouldn’t starve.

That would be my one piece of assvice I
would pass on to any new parents: establish good eating patterns early on – feed them what you eat or else
you will create fussy, painful eaters who refuse to try anything new. Feeding my children (balanced meals) is the
absolute BANE of my life.

As for the rest of it, I am still learning
all the time!

What do you wish you had done or not done,
a piece of assvice that you would pass on to others?

My dear
friend Jennifer and her husband have put together a really sweet book that
makes the perfect gift for first time fathers, just in time for Father's Day!

While
some men are absolute ‘naturals’ when it comes to tiny babies, there are many,
like my husband, who were complete novices when their first little baby
arrives. So much of the ‘fuss’ pre and
post birth is around the mom (as it should be!) that the poor dads often get
totally forgotten about and their introduction to babies is a baptism by fire.

This beautiful
little book is a the perfect ‘baby shower’ gift for all new dads and besides
the stunning photos it contains, it also has some pretty insightful tips and
advice from the author (James, Jennifer’s husband) who is a father of three
himself. Newborn bonding, carrying, skin-to-skin
contact, diapering, going places, napping, playing, exercising, reading to baby
etc is all covered in a lighthearted and informative way.

I
recently posted a note on Twitter
saying that we are looking for Black and Coloured egg donors for our egg donor program, and I got quite a few notes
from blog readers telling me that ‘coloured’ is an offensive term in the
USA. Well, being called “Coloured” in South
Africa is not offensive; in fact, it is damn cool to be coloured!

I’ve
chatted about this before, but those who are new’ish or missed it the first
time, I thought I would chat about it again.

‘Coloured’
is one of the four main racial classifications in South Africa: Black, White, Coloured and Indian. Coloured people in South Africa make up
around 10% of the population and have a very strong cultural identity. Most coloured people are proud to be coloured (except for the few who prefer to go by the label 'so called Coloured'). The Coloured culture seems to have inherited all the best aspects of both white and black culture and the are a
damn fun bunch of people. Ek is baie lief
vir die bruin mense.

I don’t
have time to go into a lengthy discussion, but check Wikipedia for a bit of an
explanation. It doesn’t do it
enough justice, but it will have to do for now – any South African coloured readers willing to give it a
bash? What does the term ‘coloured’ mean
to you? What about the term ‘so called
coloured’. I personally don’t get that one. Neil,
Rafiq, you want to give it a go? Anyone
else?

PS If you
are a black or coloured young woman who might be interested in becoming an egg
donor, we would love to hear from you! We have so many black and coloured
couples who are longing for the opportunity to become parents. Please have a
look at our website for more
info.